


Step One: Freeze

by Zaniida



Series: The Journey of Anton O'Mara [2]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: (condensed into a very small space), (probably), Canon-Typical Violence, Coincidences, Gen, Mockery, Or Possibly Fate, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rumor Mill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:13:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25569541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zaniida/pseuds/Zaniida
Summary: Anton O'Mara is not having a good day.  Or a good week.  Or a good couple of months, ever since he'd decided to poke at a sleeping bum on the subway on his way home.ETA: By the by, I'm hosting an event starting August 1st; some detailshere, along with several BINGO boards of prompts.  This fic didn't end up as an FMI, but its prequel was a Dark Inverted FMI; the event is all about FMI fics so that's what I've been working on.
Series: The Journey of Anton O'Mara [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1092663
Comments: 17
Kudos: 8





	Step One: Freeze

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Tamuril2](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tamuril2/gifts), [tilla123](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tilla123/gifts).



> And the twerp is back! Let's see what Anton's been up to while Team Machine has been working their cases.
> 
> By the by, my beta reader confused Anton O'Mara with Anthony Marconi, and I am _yet again_ reminded that the writers of this show should've gotten some sort of baby names book and tried to avoid making so many names with the same dang sounds. (Most notably: John + Shaw + Joss + Jess, and for those of you who have never studied phonemes: Three of those have the same vowel sound, two have identical consonants, and J and SH are closely related sounds, and if I were comparing texts in different languages and found these words I'd be likely to think they were all the same word just with little shifts in grammar or dialect.)

He’s strolling toward the fountains in the park, putting off the inevitable meeting with his friends (who’ve finally gotten out of the hospital), when his body suddenly freezes, his lungs like lead and his heart pounding in his chest.

It takes him a moment to pick out the thing he’s reacting to: a man in a suit harassing a skateboarder, flashing a badge; the man’s got his back to Anton, and Anton manages to get control of himself enough to slip behind a tree, where he stays, trembling, for what feels like hours. When one of the buskers comes over to ask if he’s all right, Anton runs, feeling every moment like the man is on his heels.

That night, he convinces himself that there are countless suited men in the city, and that it’s almost impossible that he ran into the same one, so far from his normal hangouts. But when he dreams, he sees the moment that clued him in: a cell phone flying across the pavement, slapped out of the teen’s hand by that man who was clearly, _clearly_ not a cop.

* * *

When he finally works up the courage to see his friends, they don’t beat him up nearly as badly as he’d expected, but they mock him enough, trading comments about his “sugar daddy,” the guy in the suit. Anton gives Troy a bloody lip, mostly on principle.

Keith mentions that a friend of his cousin has been keeping tabs on Detective Carter, and that she’s nosing around after some guy in a suit. Going pale doesn’t help with the mockery, but Anton feels too sick to care. At least if it’s clear that he’s terrified of the guy, his friends won’t think that he’s somehow in league with him.

* * *

The next time is a fluke: While Seamus limps into an apartment to broker a deal, Anton stands guard, and he’s just starting to feel bored when he hears a quick exchange of gunfire from across the street. He hits the ground behind Seamus’s car and watches, horrified, as a man in a suit drags a body up out of a downstairs apartment and down the street a ways before tossing it into the trunk of a car and casually driving off.

Despite the dim street lamps, he did get a decent look at the man’s face: There’s no mistaking it this time. He stays on the sidewalk, choking back sobs until Seamus shows up and kicks him in the shin.

“What’s the matter with you?” Seamus growls. Apparently he didn’t even hear the gunshots.

* * *

“Another sighting of your sugar daddy,” Troy says smugly. “Out by the waterfront. Broke a guy’s window and tasered him in broad daylight.” He sounds almost impressed.

Anton just sneers at him, and keeps packing the next shipment for the Bulgarians, wishing that he could run off and live in some small town like he used to, where the man in the suit wouldn’t find him. But all he’s got is here on the Lower East Side, and where would he even go? The guy follows him even into his dreams.

* * *

Seamus’s bum leg (thanks to the man in the suit) has Anton handling more of the big deliveries. The Double D’s come first—the Bulgarians—and he’s just coming out with two big empty bags when he hears gunfire down the street. Lots of it. Shattering glass.

Both palms get skinned as he vaults behind a dumpster and scrambles desperately underneath it, on the verge of praying to a god he no longer believes in. How many times this month is he going to get shot at?

He’s almost not surprised when he hears the voice that haunts his dreams. Not clear enough to make out the words, but when Anton peeks out from under the edge of the dumpster, he sees the guy’s got a gun out, and is pulling another guy along by the upper arm. And the other guy—some pudgy middle-aged man who looks like the last kind of guy to end up in a firefight—appears to be wounded, but there’s no telling who did the wounding.

* * *

“Guess who shot down a _consulate car_ in broad daylight? Angelo’s little brother saw it happen. Says the gun he used was _huge_ , man.”

“Heard he stole an ambulance, too. With a dying man inside. Guy’s cold-blooded; wonder what he wants the body for?”

Anton wishes they would all just _shut up_.

* * *

He’s just getting into his car after dropping off some guns for Hector’s gang when there’s an explosion from the garage he just left; it rocks the car, and he freezes, key halfway into the ignition switch. When he dares to glance over, he sees a guy in leathers striding right for the giant gaping hole in the door that moments ago was labeled _Hector’s_ in giant orange letters.

He can’t get his hands to move. If he tried to drive now, he’d probably crash into something. Or drive straight off into the water.

A few shots later, and Hector’s garish purple GTO comes peeling out, and Anton doesn’t need to get a good look at the driver to know exactly who just stole the most recognizable car in the city.

* * *

A week later, he’s window-shopping for a new bike, admiring all the high-tech versions that he’ll never own and wishing he had the money, or could at least drum up the courage it’d take to steal that much from Seamus. Not that he even knows how to drive the thing, but he could learn. (But then, it’s not like he could deliver sacks of guns on a _bike_.)

And then, as he’s crossing the street, debating if it’s worth taking a look at the kind of bikes that are actually in his budget, some old guy in a fancy suit (the kind who could _afford_ a nice bike, but would never actually _ride_ the thing) cries out _Oh my god, it’s a bomb!_

Anton freezes, _again_ , his eyes tearing up at how useless he gets in any sort of danger now, but then he struggles past the feeling and whirls around, looking around frantically (there’s nowhere to hide) for the man in the suit who has to be around here, has to be involved—but there’s no one who looks even _close_ to the man who’s been dogging his heels all these months. Just the old guy, jerkily limping forward— _I have to warn him!_ —

—and then a massive explosion throws both of them off their feet.

Through the ringing in his ears that muffles the horrified cries of onlookers, all Anton can think is that it’s the first time in three months that he’s been hit by _something_ that isn’t directly related to that damn man in the suit.

**Author's Note:**

> Alt Title: _Anton's Sugar Daddy_
> 
> My favorite part of this sequence was finding a scene in almost every episode that, from the outside and without context, makes John look ever more like a serial killer ^_^


End file.
